Organic electronic components are currently always more widely used because they offer numerous advantages as regards costs in terms of production, output and flexibility. Among the organic electronic components we can find organic LEDs and organic solar cells.
Document U.S. Pat. No. 5,629,389, which is incorporated herein by reference, describes an organic electroluminescent diode including a substrate, an electroluminescent organic layer which is inserted between a lower electrode in contact with the substrate and an upper electrode, and which is able to emit radiation through at least one of the electrodes when current is injected through the active layer by such electrodes. However, the scattering into the organic layer of some elements existing in the air, such as dioxygen or water vapor, results in the deterioration of the active layer which limits the service life of the diode.
In order to remedy such a problem, systems for encapsulating organic electronic components have been developed. Then, U.S. Pat. No. 5,872,355, which is incorporated herein by reference, describes the utilization of a polymer barrier seal of the Saran type placed around the electroluminescent diode and making it possible to reduce the attacks of the active layer by dioxygen, the water vapor or the other elements existing in the air. However, the water vapor permeability rate requested to guarantee a sufficient service life of the organic diode is approximately equal to 10−6 g m−2 per day−1 atm−1. Now, the best polymer films have water vapor permeability which is approximately 5 times this rate. Such encapsulation systems are thus not sufficient to guarantee a satisfactory service life of the organic components.
Other encapsulation systems have been developed. Thus, the article published by Christoph Lungenschmied, Gilles Dennler, Helmut Neugebauer, Serdar N. Sariciftci, Markus Glatthaar, Toby Meyer, Andreas Meyer and entitled “Flexible, long-lived, large-area, organic solar cells” and published in Solar Energy Materials & Solar Cells 91 (2007) 379-384, and which is incorporated herein by reference, describes an organic/inorganic multilayer composed of PET(SiOx/PEN)*5 which encapsulates an organic diode so as to protect it against environmental attacks. However, the multiplication of layers reduces the flexibility of the diode and increases the manufacturing cost of the component.
In addition, in the case of other organic electronic components, such as organic solar cells, this protection is not sufficient.